Shares of Concordia International tumbled on Friday after the company replaced its chief financial officer and slashed its outlook.

Concordia now expects full-year revenue will be in a range of US$859 million to US$888 million, compared with the previous outlook for as much as US$1.06 billion.  The company also knocked down its adjusted EBITDA view to a range of US$510 million to US$540 million from the previous call for as much as US$640 million.

“We have revised our 2016 guidance to reflect the impact of unexpected competition on several products in our North America segment, and current foreign currency exchange rates,” said CEO Mark Thompson in a statement. 

On the conference call, Thompson acknowledged the company was caught off guard by how quickly generic alternatives to some of its drugs cropped up.

“Across the industry, no one expected [prostate cancer treatment] Nilandron to go generic, but it did,” he said.

The company also highlighted what it calls “illegal” generic competition to its irritable bowel syndrome treatment Donnatal, comparing it to a legal case the company won against Method Pharmaceuticals in January, 2016.

“We’ve seen companies list products that are in the same category of Donnatal, taking advantage of Donnatal’s unique regulatory status,” said Executive VP Edward Borkowski on the call. “What we’ve seen is another company list, and they’ve actually launched product into the market on a small regional basis.”

Concordia also announced on Friday that CFO Adrian de Saldanha is leaving the organization “to pursue other opportunities.”  He’s being replaced by Borkowski. The company also disclosed it’s suspending its dividend to focus on debt repayments and “long-term value-creating initiatives.” 

Concordia, which has been targeted by short sellers, reported a second-quarter net loss of US$570.4 million, or US$11.18 per share. On an adjusted basis, it reported a profit of US$1.38 per share. 

There was no update in Friday’s earnings release or during the conference call on the status of Concordia’s strategic review, which was launched earlier this year.

Concordia shares traded as low as $15.50 in the first hour of trading at the Toronto Stock Exchange this morning -- the first time since April 2014 that the stock has traded below $20 per share -- before closing at $12.95, down $8.31 or 39 per cent from the previous close.

Concordia shares had already lost about 80 per cent of their value since rising above $100 per share a year ago, closing Thursday at $21.26, representing a market value of about $816 million prior to Friday's plunge.

“That [Concordia one-year] chart is puke-worthy,” said Barry Schwartz, chief investment officer at Baskin Wealth Management, in an interview with BNN.  “When everybody followed the Valeant model, it was gold – it was raining cash for this stock.  It turns out it’s a flawed model and they need to change really fast.”